I guess I'm not much of a philosopher, deficient as I am in the requisite thinking equipment. The only important philosophical question that has occurred to me is
When you use the flush in a plane and the stuff disappears with a "whooosh" where does it really go?
According to Shakespeare, who seems to have studied the subject deeply, It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath. Who am I to argue with the Bard? I have been intensely suspicious of light drizzles ever since I read The Merchant of Venice.
But of late, I have been vexed with questions of an existential nature. "Who am I?" is a thought that often bothers me, though Sheela feels that it is not entirely a coincidence that these thoughts occur after consuming a few beers. So when the opportunity of taking a pilgrimage to Shirdi presented itself, I tarried not.
We took the first pit stop at Pune where we stayed with Sheela's sister-in-law's sister's family who have 2 kids aged 4 and 2 respectively. Joining us there were Sheela's brother Sundeep and his family comprising of one harried wife and three kids aged 5, 3 and 1 respectively. My kids, 13 and 10, looked like senior citizens. All these children were extremely adorable, except for the charming tendency children have of yelling, crying and throwing up without warning, sometimes simultaneously. The guys followed the time honored male response to juvenile crises - Go yell some place else - and thoughtfully sipped on Kingfisher draught. This brought forth thoughtful observations from the respective spouses as to what might happen to people who don't get off their fat butts and tend to their progeny. I had a large grin on my face throughout the proceedings since I had had the foresight to have my kids twelve years ago.
We drove to Shirdi very early in the morning - 4 a.m. in fact - the idea being that the kids would spend the entire journey fast asleep. This turned out to be perfect. The tots indeed slept the sleep of the innocent. Somehow I never got these bright ideas when my kids were growing up. Sheela and I would travel around in our Maruti van those days with all our limbs involved in driving, steering, restraining children from jumping out the window and in my case, occasionally heaping abuse on errant autorickshaw drivers. Compared to our travails this was serenity it self.
Sundeep was driving and I had the luxury of admiring the creeping crimson of day break. Presently, we came across a truck overturned, doubtless due to the driver having been observing the creeping crimson of daybreak. The truck was carrying a consignment of beer and there was a throng of happy looking villagers looking forward to a serious party at six in the morning, foraging amongst the cartons. The driver and his assistant were sitting on a culvert looking shaken but unhurt. All this had naturally caused a traffic jam - passing truck drivers had parked their vehicles and jumped into the fray. We were lucky to wriggle out of this one. The accident had just happened and word had gotten out. I could see villagers streaming in from every direction. It would have been fun to see all these people sloshed out of their minds at daybreak but we had a mission to accomplish.
Presently, we reached Sai Baba Temple at Shirdi and joined the queue. It was quite long and took us almost 2 hours to get to the main sanctum. But the crowds were extremely decorous and well behaved. Most of them were singing Bhajans. There were the usual devotees in a hurry, trying to get in through side entrances. One old man and his wife were simply jumping the line at every opportunity. No one seemed to mind, though.
Sai Baba is a mystic saint of whose origins little is known. He lived at the turn of the century and preached religious harmony. And lived in abject poverty in life, something which always wins my respect when I see it in people who have the adulation of the public. Mahatma Gandhi was another example. Have you heard of any of his sons, grandchildren, cousins, uncles, brothers-in-law, any one at all cashing in on his name? Contrast that with the present day bunch of money grubbing parasites masquerading as leaders.
Any way, I found Shirdi charming because of its simple, if garish, devotion. It is a bit tatty but thats because most of Sai Baba's devotees are poor people, but no less sincere for that. The other thing is the number of hotels here and their names. Almost all the hotels are named using the formula "HOTEL" + "SAI" + "$STRING$" where "$STRING$" is any alphanumeric string from "PALACE" to "AMRIT" to "KRIPA"
We headed on to a nearby town named Shingnapur which is famous for a Shani Temple. Shani is a demigod whose major trip in life, if astrologers are to be believed, is to attach himself to you and torment you till you pay your astrologer some money and get him to tell you what mantras to chant and when. We performed a prophylactic puja which involve pouring oil on the large stone that represents him. All throughout the wily residents of the place were trying their level best to rip us off. We put up a futile resistance till we realized that liberty was to be had by flinging small amounts of cash at all and sundry.
The drive all through was beautiful. This is good farming country, mostly sugarcane and grapes. The countryside was verdant. I guess the farmers are quite rich. The roads were quite alright by the exacting standards of Maharashtra where a density of 3.7 potholes per square meter qualifies as a superdeluxe express highway. We reached Pune in the evening, a bit weary but raring to get back home where some exciting homework awaited the boys. They tried everything in their powers to get their stay extended by a day. I was lending support from the outside, as they say in politics, but the motion could not be carried through because of determined opposition from the ruling junta, namely General Sheela Shenoy. So we trundled off to Mumbai, weary but chilled. And that constitutes my incoherence for today. Those of you who made sense of it, god bless.
Thursday, October 4, 2007
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
India wins some cricket
On September 24th, 2007, the Indian cricket team achieved immortality by winning the 20-20 cricket world cup, or so the sportscasters would have you believe. Personally, I think, yeah, sure, these guys are immortal. Others may have to make path breaking scientific discoveries, develop life saving medicines or devote a lifetime to the service of the downtrodden in order to make it to the immortal list. These chaps just have to slam a ball around. I happened to witness these celebrations at a local watering hole.......
I was a reveler at last evening's madness when India beat Pakistan at the final of the 20-20 cricket world cup. We watched it at a pub named On Toes where some 100 people had congregated. The decibel level was huge. I personally lost a significant quantity of earwax on account of a portly gentleman seated directly behind me shrieking like a banshee. If his saliva has therapeutic value for hair growth, I'm going to be the next Rapunzel because every time he shrieked, he delivered a thimbleful on my thinning tresses. By the end of the match I must have collected a good bottle full. My hair feels soapy even at the moment of going to press.
The lubricant for the evening was Kingfisher beer. To put things precisely, as a mathematician would, If "n" be the number of beers an adult male can consume without losing control of his legs, then I had n+1 beers. Luckily for me, the place was so tightly packed that it was impossible to fall down. Otherwise I should surely have been trampled to death. In the event, I found myself miraculously conveyed out of the place after the revelry had ceased. May be God does exist and maybe he does graciously save the likes of me from impromptu physical restructuring. Glory be.
The revelry was consistently high on wattage. Every vocal chord in the room was being subjected to the most intense testing through the game. Since India won, everyone was strutting around like they were Sylvester Stallone. A cost effective way to commit suicide would have been to shout "Pakistan Zindabad". The lingering feeling was "We are the best! We are the best!"
I personally thought it a little far fetched to take this victory as proof of India's overall superiority over the rest of the world in all things, as the crowd seemed to feel. We might have the capacity to hit balls further than people from neighboring countries but as far as government is concerned, India sucks big time. Any way, since this is not about that, we shall discuss matters more germane to the issue.
The game itself was a slug fest where the batsmen heaved at everything that came their way. Occasionally, one of these heaves would connect satisfactorily which would bring our erudite little gathering to hysterics.
One guy had brought a bus horn with which he would make bus-honk noises every time India score runs or got wickets. One or two of the company, on realizing that their Men Friday had omitted to pack such an instrument amongst their personal effects, managed to produce similar sounds with their armpits.
There were many whistlers, of whom I was a distinguished member. I may not be in line for Nobel Prize or even the chairmanship of our PTA group, but even my harshest critics will admit that I can whistle."He was an insignificant person", my obituary might read "and consistently charmless, but he could whistle louder than 97 percent of the population".Say that much and my soul will rest in peace.
I woke up this morning to the usual Broken Compass hangover where one loses one's sense of orientation and decided to quickly put my feelings down on paper - e-paper, if you will - before the moment vanished. Congratulations, all my fellow Indians out there. Way to go!
I was a reveler at last evening's madness when India beat Pakistan at the final of the 20-20 cricket world cup. We watched it at a pub named On Toes where some 100 people had congregated. The decibel level was huge. I personally lost a significant quantity of earwax on account of a portly gentleman seated directly behind me shrieking like a banshee. If his saliva has therapeutic value for hair growth, I'm going to be the next Rapunzel because every time he shrieked, he delivered a thimbleful on my thinning tresses. By the end of the match I must have collected a good bottle full. My hair feels soapy even at the moment of going to press.
The lubricant for the evening was Kingfisher beer. To put things precisely, as a mathematician would, If "n" be the number of beers an adult male can consume without losing control of his legs, then I had n+1 beers. Luckily for me, the place was so tightly packed that it was impossible to fall down. Otherwise I should surely have been trampled to death. In the event, I found myself miraculously conveyed out of the place after the revelry had ceased. May be God does exist and maybe he does graciously save the likes of me from impromptu physical restructuring. Glory be.
The revelry was consistently high on wattage. Every vocal chord in the room was being subjected to the most intense testing through the game. Since India won, everyone was strutting around like they were Sylvester Stallone. A cost effective way to commit suicide would have been to shout "Pakistan Zindabad". The lingering feeling was "We are the best! We are the best!"
I personally thought it a little far fetched to take this victory as proof of India's overall superiority over the rest of the world in all things, as the crowd seemed to feel. We might have the capacity to hit balls further than people from neighboring countries but as far as government is concerned, India sucks big time. Any way, since this is not about that, we shall discuss matters more germane to the issue.
The game itself was a slug fest where the batsmen heaved at everything that came their way. Occasionally, one of these heaves would connect satisfactorily which would bring our erudite little gathering to hysterics.
One guy had brought a bus horn with which he would make bus-honk noises every time India score runs or got wickets. One or two of the company, on realizing that their Men Friday had omitted to pack such an instrument amongst their personal effects, managed to produce similar sounds with their armpits.
There were many whistlers, of whom I was a distinguished member. I may not be in line for Nobel Prize or even the chairmanship of our PTA group, but even my harshest critics will admit that I can whistle."He was an insignificant person", my obituary might read "and consistently charmless, but he could whistle louder than 97 percent of the population".Say that much and my soul will rest in peace.
I woke up this morning to the usual Broken Compass hangover where one loses one's sense of orientation and decided to quickly put my feelings down on paper - e-paper, if you will - before the moment vanished. Congratulations, all my fellow Indians out there. Way to go!
Monday, September 17, 2007
Traffic Jam Rant
(Note: I wrote this piece last New Year, that is Jan 1st 2007. It was said by knowledgeable sources (namely me) that there were more trenches in Mumbai in 2007 that in all of Europe during World War II. Since that time, most of the trenches have been filled up and levelled. But the traffic is still snarling. Behind my house runs an arterial road where they play what I call "The Horn Concerto" in various keys. This is in several movements and features about 5 hours of virtuoso honking every evening. It is often supported by improptu poets who disembark from their vehicles and narrate instantly composed odes to the parentage of other people).
They are at it again, the jokers at the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai. They have opened up the road at the main junction to our house, this being the third time in as many years. And its not one of those small, lets-plant-a-bonsai-tree-in-it kind of hole. Its a holy-smoke-did-an-asteroid-land-here kind and at the moment of going to press, is the scene of a world record traffic jam that a woefully inadequate police force of one is trying to disentangle. We will wish him all the best and with the reflective smugness of one who went walking instead of taking his car, we shall analyze and introspect.
I am forever fascinated by the trouble and expense to which our honorable civic body is willing to go for no discernible reason other than seeing what color it is in there. I've seen it in all these excavations. The place is dug up real fast, all the mud piled up in large mounds along the road. Then everyone disappears for a while as if to allow their masterpiece to mature.
Meanwhile, the doofuses* that populate Mumbai go nuts trying to race everyone else around the crater and end up jamming the traffic something bad. That's a specialty of Mumbai's citizens. Just as nature abhors a vacuum, the Mumbai driver abhors a vacant space in the traffic, regardless of how small it is in relation to the vehicle he is driving. He has to occupy that gap. Now everyone else wedges in and the resultant impasse can be quite depressing. If you've GOT to go to the loo, for example, you're in trouble.
My grouse is, regardless of this scene being repeated everyday - and my description is no exaggeration, any Mumbaikar will bear me out - the Municipal Corporation just shrugs its shoulders, twiddles its thumbs and sits on its fat gluteus maximus**. And the public just grins and bears it. Everytime. Everyone can see the callous lack of planning and coordination. They will invariably dig up all parallel streets at the same time, for example, allowing no scope for charting out an alternative route. They will dig up the place and then wait for months before the pipes or cables that they wish to place in arrive. Sometimes, they get existential doubts and fill up the pit without doing anything till they get their supply of Prozac and dig it up again. I don't think anyone has every lost his job for dereliction of duty in the Municipality.*** In fact, George Mallory's famous quote (Why do you want to climb Everest? Because it is there) is actually inspired by Assistant Engineer Kamble's famous quote (Why do you want to dig that road? Because it is there)
Thus, life goes on as usual. Today is the 31st of December, and later at night, St. Vitus' patients will usher in the new year as defined by Pope Gregory XIII. A meaningless ritual given that it is not our New Year. To complicate things, there are three or four alternative calendars seriously followed in India, positing the existence of three or four New Years. What sets this one apart is the fact that this particular meaningless ritual is accompanied by the consumption of large quantities of the true, the blushful Hippocrene. Hmmm. Sounds like fun, actually. I think I'd like to take part in a meaningless ritual or two myself.
Footnotes
* - A doofus is the scientific name for a person with inadequate intellectual equipment. Currently, with the exception of you and me, includes everyone in the world.
** - A large muscle situate at the lower posterior of the human body. Sometimes erroneously referred to as the "ass", which is wrong. Every one knows that "ass"means "Member of Parliament"
***-Or, for that matter, any public enterprise or Government body in India
They are at it again, the jokers at the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai. They have opened up the road at the main junction to our house, this being the third time in as many years. And its not one of those small, lets-plant-a-bonsai-tree-in-it kind of hole. Its a holy-smoke-did-an-asteroid-land-here kind and at the moment of going to press, is the scene of a world record traffic jam that a woefully inadequate police force of one is trying to disentangle. We will wish him all the best and with the reflective smugness of one who went walking instead of taking his car, we shall analyze and introspect.
I am forever fascinated by the trouble and expense to which our honorable civic body is willing to go for no discernible reason other than seeing what color it is in there. I've seen it in all these excavations. The place is dug up real fast, all the mud piled up in large mounds along the road. Then everyone disappears for a while as if to allow their masterpiece to mature.
Meanwhile, the doofuses* that populate Mumbai go nuts trying to race everyone else around the crater and end up jamming the traffic something bad. That's a specialty of Mumbai's citizens. Just as nature abhors a vacuum, the Mumbai driver abhors a vacant space in the traffic, regardless of how small it is in relation to the vehicle he is driving. He has to occupy that gap. Now everyone else wedges in and the resultant impasse can be quite depressing. If you've GOT to go to the loo, for example, you're in trouble.
My grouse is, regardless of this scene being repeated everyday - and my description is no exaggeration, any Mumbaikar will bear me out - the Municipal Corporation just shrugs its shoulders, twiddles its thumbs and sits on its fat gluteus maximus**. And the public just grins and bears it. Everytime. Everyone can see the callous lack of planning and coordination. They will invariably dig up all parallel streets at the same time, for example, allowing no scope for charting out an alternative route. They will dig up the place and then wait for months before the pipes or cables that they wish to place in arrive. Sometimes, they get existential doubts and fill up the pit without doing anything till they get their supply of Prozac and dig it up again. I don't think anyone has every lost his job for dereliction of duty in the Municipality.*** In fact, George Mallory's famous quote (Why do you want to climb Everest? Because it is there) is actually inspired by Assistant Engineer Kamble's famous quote (Why do you want to dig that road? Because it is there)
Thus, life goes on as usual. Today is the 31st of December, and later at night, St. Vitus' patients will usher in the new year as defined by Pope Gregory XIII. A meaningless ritual given that it is not our New Year. To complicate things, there are three or four alternative calendars seriously followed in India, positing the existence of three or four New Years. What sets this one apart is the fact that this particular meaningless ritual is accompanied by the consumption of large quantities of the true, the blushful Hippocrene. Hmmm. Sounds like fun, actually. I think I'd like to take part in a meaningless ritual or two myself.
Footnotes
* - A doofus is the scientific name for a person with inadequate intellectual equipment. Currently, with the exception of you and me, includes everyone in the world.
** - A large muscle situate at the lower posterior of the human body. Sometimes erroneously referred to as the "ass", which is wrong. Every one knows that "ass"means "Member of Parliament"
***-Or, for that matter, any public enterprise or Government body in India
Friday, September 14, 2007
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Not about Reverse Transcriptase
I am accused of writing only about my family and the old better half has threatened to rearrange my facial features if I don't find something else to write about, or find something nice to write about her.
Well, I guess I do tend to dwell on that topic but that's only because I'm such a peanut-brain. I hardly know anything about anything else. I mean, can you imagine me writing about, say, the role of reverse transcriptase in virus reproduction?
I just looked up Wikipedia on this, which is lucky because otherwise what you would have got on virus reproduction would be a blow-by-blow account of how the boy virus takes the girl virus out to a movie, how they fall in love, how papa virus sends a lot of goon viruses to fix the boy virus, how the boy virus bashes up all of them, how the girl virus and the boy virus get married, how they get a lot of baby viruses and which is why Pamela's got herpes simplex.
So I decided to see how many words I could type without referring to the activities of the loved ones. I know, this begs the question, why write at all, but its either that or watch television.
Now television is something I deeply dread. There is always lurking in every channel a character played with hysterical intensity by a fat young lady who portrays a 60 year old. Her name is Smriti Irani. She has two facial expressions - gritting her teeth and crying. Usually, she does both. Free dental insurance is written into her contract so that she doesn't withhold herself from really launching into the role.
Which is why I think writing is better. For me at least, if not you, my dear hapless reader. I know why you're reading this. Not because you like it. It is because of a morbid curiosity that is genetically programmed into humans. It is why we peep into open septic tanks or order the bright green colored gravy in Shetty restaurants. Can't resist it.
I still haven't said anything specific, have I? Well, I am an MBA by training and I can continue for ever in this vein. You should attend some corporate meetings, just for laughs. They can go on stating and re-stating the obvious in ever increasing circularity and specialize in what is known as creative inaction.
So here's my topic for today, corporate etiquette. Fill out this questionnaire and evaluate your Corporate Etiquette Quotient (CEQ)
1. You are sitting next to your CEO in an important meeting. He farts audibly. You
If you've answered all a's, proceed straight to the employment exchange. You couldn't hold a job at a morgue - the corpses would reject you.
If you've answered all b's you're a sure candidate for hypertension, supressing all those emotions. But you'll get you're gold retirement watch, you will, provided you don't die of an infarct.
If you've answered all c's, Welcome to the Corporate World! In CEQ terms, you're Einstein, baby! Would you like your million dollar bonus in Indian currency or should we quietly deposit it in a Swiss Bank account?
Well, I guess I do tend to dwell on that topic but that's only because I'm such a peanut-brain. I hardly know anything about anything else. I mean, can you imagine me writing about, say, the role of reverse transcriptase in virus reproduction?
I just looked up Wikipedia on this, which is lucky because otherwise what you would have got on virus reproduction would be a blow-by-blow account of how the boy virus takes the girl virus out to a movie, how they fall in love, how papa virus sends a lot of goon viruses to fix the boy virus, how the boy virus bashes up all of them, how the girl virus and the boy virus get married, how they get a lot of baby viruses and which is why Pamela's got herpes simplex.
So I decided to see how many words I could type without referring to the activities of the loved ones. I know, this begs the question, why write at all, but its either that or watch television.
Now television is something I deeply dread. There is always lurking in every channel a character played with hysterical intensity by a fat young lady who portrays a 60 year old. Her name is Smriti Irani. She has two facial expressions - gritting her teeth and crying. Usually, she does both. Free dental insurance is written into her contract so that she doesn't withhold herself from really launching into the role.
Which is why I think writing is better. For me at least, if not you, my dear hapless reader. I know why you're reading this. Not because you like it. It is because of a morbid curiosity that is genetically programmed into humans. It is why we peep into open septic tanks or order the bright green colored gravy in Shetty restaurants. Can't resist it.
I still haven't said anything specific, have I? Well, I am an MBA by training and I can continue for ever in this vein. You should attend some corporate meetings, just for laughs. They can go on stating and re-stating the obvious in ever increasing circularity and specialize in what is known as creative inaction.
So here's my topic for today, corporate etiquette. Fill out this questionnaire and evaluate your Corporate Etiquette Quotient (CEQ)
1. You are sitting next to your CEO in an important meeting. He farts audibly. You
- a. Laugh loudly, pointing at him
- b. Pretend nothing happened
- c. Behave as if it was you who farted and apologize aloud.
- a. Pretend to sniff the CEO's mouth and ask loudly if he's drunk.
- b. Sit tight and say nothing
- c. Tear up your papers quietly and applaud the CEO's idea vociferously
- a. Attempt to stab the CEO with the staple opener
- b. Sit tight and say nothing, while surreptitiously wiping away a tear
- c. Shake the CEO's hand and compliment him on being such an excellent judge of people.
If you've answered all a's, proceed straight to the employment exchange. You couldn't hold a job at a morgue - the corpses would reject you.
If you've answered all b's you're a sure candidate for hypertension, supressing all those emotions. But you'll get you're gold retirement watch, you will, provided you don't die of an infarct.
If you've answered all c's, Welcome to the Corporate World! In CEQ terms, you're Einstein, baby! Would you like your million dollar bonus in Indian currency or should we quietly deposit it in a Swiss Bank account?
Sunday, September 9, 2007
Dad, 2007
A good friend of mine, an advertising guru, wrote in his blog about how parenting stereotypes are changing and how kids are increasingly perceiving themselves to be the equals of their parents. At least, that is how I understood it. This, of course, is totally untrue in my case - my children would be mortified to be described as my intellectual equals. I currently occupy the position of earthworm in the evolutionary scale. It is true that I have a certain rude ability to solve algebraic equations but hey, just because a tadpole can swim better than you, it does not mean he is Ian Thorpe.
His point was that relationships at home have changed. Dads are no longer the authoritarian figures they were. That is so true. I remember my childhood. Important decisions were not 'discussed' as they are today. "Discussed " here means "the parents were formally informed by the kids of what they were going to do". Important decisions, such as what career to pursue or what clothes to wear, would be taken by dad or, on occasion, Mom, without any suffrage to the affected parties. Didn't like it? Free country, you could always leave the house.
Thus, most of my generation have a tremendously formal relationship with the male parent. True, the economic strings have long been disconnected but nobody told Dad that. We still behave as if half expecting to be thrown out of the house for our indiscretions. The whisky is hidden away. The language goes up a few notches in formality. The 'bahu' chooses the sari or the salwar suit instead of the capri and short top, when dad drops in for a short stay.
In sharp contradistinction (I love using big words - that one has 17 letters - because of the impression of erudition it carries, as opposed to actually being erudite) the relationship that dads of my generation have with their children border on the patronizing. The children patronizing the adult, that is. The male parent is usually a spent force when it comes to disciplinary matters.I know I'm making sweeping generalizations here. Some of you reading this will say, sotto voce, "Speak for yourself, wimp. My wife and kids tremble when I roar!" If that is so, please autograph my T shirt and send me your correspondence course on Parenting by Terror.
As I was saying, it is the kids who adopt the didactic tone instead of the other way around, instructing with painful patience the minutiae of CS (which is "Counter Strike", the game, and not "Company Secretary", the career option) to the doofus who, had he not been the fortuitous contributor of the necessary chromosomes, would have been unworthy of attention.
"Dad, how did you get to be in your position in life - you are such a clot" might be a typical sentence in most Mumbai households today. May be some advertising could be based on this insight.
His point was that relationships at home have changed. Dads are no longer the authoritarian figures they were. That is so true. I remember my childhood. Important decisions were not 'discussed' as they are today. "Discussed " here means "the parents were formally informed by the kids of what they were going to do". Important decisions, such as what career to pursue or what clothes to wear, would be taken by dad or, on occasion, Mom, without any suffrage to the affected parties. Didn't like it? Free country, you could always leave the house.
Thus, most of my generation have a tremendously formal relationship with the male parent. True, the economic strings have long been disconnected but nobody told Dad that. We still behave as if half expecting to be thrown out of the house for our indiscretions. The whisky is hidden away. The language goes up a few notches in formality. The 'bahu' chooses the sari or the salwar suit instead of the capri and short top, when dad drops in for a short stay.
In sharp contradistinction (I love using big words - that one has 17 letters - because of the impression of erudition it carries, as opposed to actually being erudite) the relationship that dads of my generation have with their children border on the patronizing. The children patronizing the adult, that is. The male parent is usually a spent force when it comes to disciplinary matters.I know I'm making sweeping generalizations here. Some of you reading this will say, sotto voce, "Speak for yourself, wimp. My wife and kids tremble when I roar!" If that is so, please autograph my T shirt and send me your correspondence course on Parenting by Terror.
As I was saying, it is the kids who adopt the didactic tone instead of the other way around, instructing with painful patience the minutiae of CS (which is "Counter Strike", the game, and not "Company Secretary", the career option) to the doofus who, had he not been the fortuitous contributor of the necessary chromosomes, would have been unworthy of attention.
"Dad, how did you get to be in your position in life - you are such a clot" might be a typical sentence in most Mumbai households today. May be some advertising could be based on this insight.
Friday, August 17, 2007
Independence day!
I have some good news and some bad news.
My wife left this morning for
No, I'm just joking. We're missing her terribly, especially when it comes to locating our stuff. My sons are a little better than me. They usually find it. I am doomed to wearing yesterday's clothes till she gets back.
She of course knows exactly where everything is. When all is lost, I call her up and she can tell me which drawer, what pile, which color, everything. Why don't I simply call her then? You're not married, I guess. Each time I call her for instructions, my stock drops a few points. I am currently in the same position as a McChicken Burger would be in a gourmet food festival. Any lower down and I'd be dog food. (I am of course making the tacit assumption here that a McChicken Burger is better than dog food, an assumption that is highly questionable. Besides the point, of course. I'll get back to the main story).
As I was saying, I have decided that I prefer to retain my dignity. Yesterday's clothes for me, I think, even though my closest friends open a window every time I get into a car with them.
Her absence had its plus points too. My sons chilled out in the manner of the peasants when the Tsar was overthrown. The peasants feasted in the palaces, it is said. My sons played computer games. I celebrated by wearing a bright blue shirt and formal brown trousers. Shoes? Reebok, of course. What do you think I am? I saw grown men wincing when I passed by and mothers gathering their children in a protective embrace when they spotted me. Yippee!
We saw a movie, Rush Hour 3, a Jackie Chan slugfest that is in no danger of winning the Oscar in any category. The boys enjoyed every minute of it and, if I may be permitted a guilty confession, so did I. Then I took them to Andheri by train, which in itself was a treat because of its rarity and bought them a few PC games on DVD. These are banned in our household, for the sheer mindlessness and crass gore that they contain. I agree with Sheela entirely on this point, but the pitiful whining of the young scions melted my stern heart. The end result of all this is that whatever little missing-you-mom emotion lingered in the lads vanished completely.
Anyway, we went out to dinner to a place called Yoko Sizzlers which, sadly, does not have any scantily clad Japanese go-go dancers as the name might suggest. They do a sizzling steak on a platter with veggies and fries, laced liberally with moderately spicy sauces. The peppery and garlicky kind, not the chilli kind. Nice food and sumptuous in quantity. It also teaches one the meaning of patience, because if you chomp a large bite, the temperature of the food will burn up your tongue pretty bad. I pigged out, as did the descendants, and a great time was had by all.
The after dinner conversation veered around the Hindi language, or my mystification regarding it. I am especially at sea when it comes to the Urdu version, as used in the movies and on telly. Kashmakash, for example. It sounds to me like a particularly passionate embrace. Turns out that it means struggle. Same thing perhaps, if you're a wrestler. Or "suroor" as in Himesh Reshammiya's latest, "Aap Ka Suroor". Isn't that a vegetable of some kind? Or am I confusing it with "Suran"? If the movie is about Himesh Reshammiya's brain, may be it DOES mean vegetable.
On this very intellectual note, we dispersed, celebrating sixty years of non-accountability, which succeeded 200 years of British non-accountability and about 5000 years of Indian Maharajah non-accountability before that. The fact that India is not only surviving but growing stronger is testimony to the resilience of its people.
Thursday, June 14, 2007
The Planter's Club - Part II
The abiding tragedy of my life is and will always be the reluctance of Shilpa Shetty to marry me. She can find no better husband - charming, witty, not averse to polygamy - but somehow she hasn't cottoned on to the idea. I therefore decided to go with the Hoysala temples (You may recall my assertion that I would prefer seeing the Hoysala temples of Belur and Halebeedu to marrying Ms. Shetty. What prompted that statement was that she wasn't really planning to marry me any way. Alright, alright, I'll get to the story)
We set out on the assurance that the roads were "okay" and took a short cut through a place called Bikkodu. It was a beautiful, rustic drive. I wondered, as I often do, why the hell I live in Bombay when there are places like this in India. On either side of the road were forests alternating with coffee estates, resplendent in various shades of green. Every now and then we would come across a house with a garden that would be bursting with flowers of almost every conceivable color. The people on the roads were simple peasants with a serene look on their faces (except one whom I splattered by driving full speed over a nice, fresh cow pat. He lost his serene look for a while, I guess. Not my fault, I had no idea these things were so sprayable.)
Anyway, we landed up in Belur for our first look at the Hoysala temples. These temples date back to the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Since I wasn't around at the time (I really regret that. Life was such a party, going by the erotic sculpture panels.) I thought it might be a smart idea to engage a guide. The guide turned out to be a motivated and serious historian who spoke excellent, if slightly accented, English. I really don't recall all the details (except the erotic sculpture panels, about which I could give a lecture series) but the intricacy of the sculpture was mind boggling.
"The stone is known as soap-stone. It is soft when quarried and hardens as it is exposed to the atmosphere. This made it possible for the sculptors to achieve this level of intricacy" said our guide, as if that made it a piece of cake. The temple was made in segments and joined with dove-tail joints and the like, as if it were wood. This makes it an achievement in engineering because the builders would have to estimate loads and design it well, lest it collapse like a pack of cards. Since that hasn't happened in the last 900 years, it would appear that they passed their engineering degree with honors. It did rather make one suck one's breath in.
We headed on to Halebeedu which is about a half hours drive from Belur through some fine and picturesque farmland. En route we were stopped by a posse of policemen standing next to a trademark rattletrap police jeep that couldn't overtake a toddler's tricycle, if the toddler's tricycle didn't want to be overtaken. I got out of the car (I was driving) and interpreted the head cop's guttural comments as a desire to see some papers. I gave him a wide choice. There were registration papers, insurance papers, papers pertaining to the first service of the vehicle, somebody's horoscope, and a blood test report. He took a hard look at them all and asked for my license. As he subjected it to his regular scrutiny, I realized he was holding it upside down. He returned all this stuff to me and decided not to press charges. Duh!
Relieved, I resumed the journey and presently we rolled into the erstwhile capital of the Hoysala kingdom. This temple was bigger - two temples adjacent, in fact - but was vandalized by the general Malik Kafur, who had sauntered into town with his army, looking for a bit of cash. This is a recurrent theme in the history of India, the Muslim conquerors' penchant for defacing fine sculpture and painting. They would come, plunder, slaughter some of the citizenry and as a parting shot, defile any decent statues they could find. The caves at Ellora will bring tears to your eyes when you see what Aurangzeb and his friends did, in the course of a weekend, to centuries of labor of the highest artistic merit and historical importance. More recently his descendants, the Taliban in Afghanistan, bombed a couple of enormous and completely harmless Buddha statues out of existence in a place called Bamiyan. And so it goes on. But let me not dwell on topics that are none of my concern, especially topics that can bring a fatwa upon my head. A fine head, if I may say so, and one that I am keenly interested in continuing the ownership of.
Coming back to my fine little travelogue, by the time we were done with Halebeedu, everyone was hungry. We decided to look around for lunch. Halebeedu, for a tourist destination, seemed strangely bereft of establishments that would sell food for money. We went to a government hotel set in a large ground. The major domo gave us the once-over and announced that all he could spare, at the moment, was rice and curd. We were really hungry and I was willing to eat even that, but the kids kicked at the prospect. Soon, their mom joined the agitation and I was overpowered and forced to look for another place. There was a bar and restaurant down the road, stocking, presumably, Dr. Mallya's finest. This was turned down on the flimsy grounds that it is not good to have so much beer. The rightful leftover, so to speak, turned out to be an establishment called Shri Krishna Veg Restaurant which did a set meal for Rs. 12 per head, consisting of cardboard cleverly disguised as food. I washed down as much of it as possible with America's contribution to the world of fine beverages, namely Coke.
"Time to head back", I told the lads and got a glazed look in reply. These guys had pigged out on the Shri Krishna Veg Restaurant gourmet cardboard-a-la-king! They had actually enjoyed this, these same ingrates who turn up their nose when I cook them an omelet. Not tasty enough for them, my omelets aren't! Well, I have a lot to say along these lines but somehow, I don't think you're dying to hear about it. So I'll conclude my concise and informative - well written, in fact - travelogue by telling you all that if you haven't seen the Hoysala Temples, you haven't lived. And for those of you who want the letters PhD after your name, there is a wonderful thesis waiting to be written on "The nutritional value of commercial cardboard" in the Shri Krishna Veg Restaurant. Maybe the way to end world hunger is to increase cardboard production.
We set out on the assurance that the roads were "okay" and took a short cut through a place called Bikkodu. It was a beautiful, rustic drive. I wondered, as I often do, why the hell I live in Bombay when there are places like this in India. On either side of the road were forests alternating with coffee estates, resplendent in various shades of green. Every now and then we would come across a house with a garden that would be bursting with flowers of almost every conceivable color. The people on the roads were simple peasants with a serene look on their faces (except one whom I splattered by driving full speed over a nice, fresh cow pat. He lost his serene look for a while, I guess. Not my fault, I had no idea these things were so sprayable.)
Anyway, we landed up in Belur for our first look at the Hoysala temples. These temples date back to the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Since I wasn't around at the time (I really regret that. Life was such a party, going by the erotic sculpture panels.) I thought it might be a smart idea to engage a guide. The guide turned out to be a motivated and serious historian who spoke excellent, if slightly accented, English. I really don't recall all the details (except the erotic sculpture panels, about which I could give a lecture series) but the intricacy of the sculpture was mind boggling.
"The stone is known as soap-stone. It is soft when quarried and hardens as it is exposed to the atmosphere. This made it possible for the sculptors to achieve this level of intricacy" said our guide, as if that made it a piece of cake. The temple was made in segments and joined with dove-tail joints and the like, as if it were wood. This makes it an achievement in engineering because the builders would have to estimate loads and design it well, lest it collapse like a pack of cards. Since that hasn't happened in the last 900 years, it would appear that they passed their engineering degree with honors. It did rather make one suck one's breath in.
We headed on to Halebeedu which is about a half hours drive from Belur through some fine and picturesque farmland. En route we were stopped by a posse of policemen standing next to a trademark rattletrap police jeep that couldn't overtake a toddler's tricycle, if the toddler's tricycle didn't want to be overtaken. I got out of the car (I was driving) and interpreted the head cop's guttural comments as a desire to see some papers. I gave him a wide choice. There were registration papers, insurance papers, papers pertaining to the first service of the vehicle, somebody's horoscope, and a blood test report. He took a hard look at them all and asked for my license. As he subjected it to his regular scrutiny, I realized he was holding it upside down. He returned all this stuff to me and decided not to press charges. Duh!
Relieved, I resumed the journey and presently we rolled into the erstwhile capital of the Hoysala kingdom. This temple was bigger - two temples adjacent, in fact - but was vandalized by the general Malik Kafur, who had sauntered into town with his army, looking for a bit of cash. This is a recurrent theme in the history of India, the Muslim conquerors' penchant for defacing fine sculpture and painting. They would come, plunder, slaughter some of the citizenry and as a parting shot, defile any decent statues they could find. The caves at Ellora will bring tears to your eyes when you see what Aurangzeb and his friends did, in the course of a weekend, to centuries of labor of the highest artistic merit and historical importance. More recently his descendants, the Taliban in Afghanistan, bombed a couple of enormous and completely harmless Buddha statues out of existence in a place called Bamiyan. And so it goes on. But let me not dwell on topics that are none of my concern, especially topics that can bring a fatwa upon my head. A fine head, if I may say so, and one that I am keenly interested in continuing the ownership of.
Coming back to my fine little travelogue, by the time we were done with Halebeedu, everyone was hungry. We decided to look around for lunch. Halebeedu, for a tourist destination, seemed strangely bereft of establishments that would sell food for money. We went to a government hotel set in a large ground. The major domo gave us the once-over and announced that all he could spare, at the moment, was rice and curd. We were really hungry and I was willing to eat even that, but the kids kicked at the prospect. Soon, their mom joined the agitation and I was overpowered and forced to look for another place. There was a bar and restaurant down the road, stocking, presumably, Dr. Mallya's finest. This was turned down on the flimsy grounds that it is not good to have so much beer. The rightful leftover, so to speak, turned out to be an establishment called Shri Krishna Veg Restaurant which did a set meal for Rs. 12 per head, consisting of cardboard cleverly disguised as food. I washed down as much of it as possible with America's contribution to the world of fine beverages, namely Coke.
"Time to head back", I told the lads and got a glazed look in reply. These guys had pigged out on the Shri Krishna Veg Restaurant gourmet cardboard-a-la-king! They had actually enjoyed this, these same ingrates who turn up their nose when I cook them an omelet. Not tasty enough for them, my omelets aren't! Well, I have a lot to say along these lines but somehow, I don't think you're dying to hear about it. So I'll conclude my concise and informative - well written, in fact - travelogue by telling you all that if you haven't seen the Hoysala Temples, you haven't lived. And for those of you who want the letters PhD after your name, there is a wonderful thesis waiting to be written on "The nutritional value of commercial cardboard" in the Shri Krishna Veg Restaurant. Maybe the way to end world hunger is to increase cardboard production.
Tuesday, June 5, 2007
The Planter's Club, Sakaleshpur
I know what you're thinking. Ho hum. Another one of them stupid vacation diaries. The Planter's Club, Sakaleshpur is where I spent a few days last week, soaking in, along with the atmosphere, a few stray drops of beer and some tremendously spicy cuisine. But hang on. The paying public demands a few footnotes and background material....
Once upon a time, long, long ago, a few Sundays back in fact, Sheela's tribe organized an impromptu outing to a coffee estate that Sheela's brother Sundeep had bought recently. Everyone was there except Prince Charming, who was basically toiling away in Bombay. Sheela rang up Prince Charming and asked him to come on his mettlesome charger and grace the gathering with his customary good humor and vivacity.
Now, Prince Charming was very busy with work, you know, slaying dragons, saving damsels in distress and sitting at the round table. He wondered aloud if it would be worthwhile going all that way just to chill out for a few days and do nothing but drink beer and eat yummy food. As he spoke, he realized that it was his beholden duty to his family to cheer them up and spend quality time with them. After all, what good is a valiant knight if he cannot spend a few days drinking really chilled beer and eating mutton pepper fry for the sake of his family? So with a heavy heart, he bid adieu to the dragons and the damsels in distress and heaved his posterior in the general direction of Mysore, wherefrom the tribe would repair to the Planter's Club, Sakaleshpur.
Well, I must confess that I (I'm taking the liberty of referring to myself in the first person. When one is Prince Charming, one does rather merit the third person treatment but jealousy abounds, dear reader. I know it astounds you, but people would actually think me arrogant if I kept referring to myself in the third person) rather imagined a planter to be a grizzled old man with his back bent from years of planting, looking yearningly skywards every now and then as if praying to the rain gods for deliverance. The Sakaleshpur Planter is anything but.
From the array of cars parked in the place, my guess was that the average Sakaleshpur Planter lived like a sheikh whose family has just installed a few new oil wells. I hobnobbed with a few and found them speaking with impeccable diction and great erudition on a wide range of subjects. One of them set me right about the Modern Art scene in India, on which topic I had recklessly shot off my mouth. I admit that I know as much about the Modern Art Scene in India as I know about the Lesser Scandinavian Poets, namely nothing, but I had never thought I would be so speedily, if gently, exposed as a goof. I quickly learnt the merits of not opening my mouth, except for the purpose of ingesting the beer and the mutton pepper fry.
Interesting place, in short, and it wasn't really opulent or anything, it had a beautiful location and great comfort. The staff was an absolute throwback to colonial times. An extremely geriatric gentleman turned out to be the cook. Eighty two years old, would you believe it. After a particularly delicious meal one evening, young Sundeep sent for him, to thank him for the wonderful meal and cross his palms with silver. It turned out that he wasn't interested in the money at all. That seemed unusual. We looked at him quizzically. After a bit of hemming and hawing, he inquired if he might speak freely. We urged him to ask unto half our kingdom, but all that he wanted, it turned out, was a large drink. The bar had closed and the bar clerk had left for the night, taking with him the keys to the liquor cabinet, so we couldn't buy him a drink. He looked yearningly at a half finished bottle of Scotch that we were sampling rather extensively. Without a second's hesitation, young Sundeep handed it over to him, the rest of the company agreeing that it was a mere bagatelle in the appreciation of culinary genius.
Next morning, we were amply recompensed for the generous liquid gift of the previous night. He cooked up a beautiful meal of "akki rotti" (rice chapaties) and some deep red concoction of spice and tomatoes that was tangy and delicious. I found I had nothing to do. Sundeep had to go back to the estate for some work, so I thought I would hijack one of the cars and explore the countryside a bit. The wife and kids agreed to join and we ended up going to the Belur and Halebeedu temples about an hours drive away. Was that good? Let me put it this way. If I have a one-or-the-other choice between seeing the temples and marrying Shilpa Shetty, I would unhesitatingly choose the temples. Only if it was a one-or-the-other choice, of course. I would much rather do both..........
Once upon a time, long, long ago, a few Sundays back in fact, Sheela's tribe organized an impromptu outing to a coffee estate that Sheela's brother Sundeep had bought recently. Everyone was there except Prince Charming, who was basically toiling away in Bombay. Sheela rang up Prince Charming and asked him to come on his mettlesome charger and grace the gathering with his customary good humor and vivacity.
Now, Prince Charming was very busy with work, you know, slaying dragons, saving damsels in distress and sitting at the round table. He wondered aloud if it would be worthwhile going all that way just to chill out for a few days and do nothing but drink beer and eat yummy food. As he spoke, he realized that it was his beholden duty to his family to cheer them up and spend quality time with them. After all, what good is a valiant knight if he cannot spend a few days drinking really chilled beer and eating mutton pepper fry for the sake of his family? So with a heavy heart, he bid adieu to the dragons and the damsels in distress and heaved his posterior in the general direction of Mysore, wherefrom the tribe would repair to the Planter's Club, Sakaleshpur.
Well, I must confess that I (I'm taking the liberty of referring to myself in the first person. When one is Prince Charming, one does rather merit the third person treatment but jealousy abounds, dear reader. I know it astounds you, but people would actually think me arrogant if I kept referring to myself in the third person) rather imagined a planter to be a grizzled old man with his back bent from years of planting, looking yearningly skywards every now and then as if praying to the rain gods for deliverance. The Sakaleshpur Planter is anything but.
From the array of cars parked in the place, my guess was that the average Sakaleshpur Planter lived like a sheikh whose family has just installed a few new oil wells. I hobnobbed with a few and found them speaking with impeccable diction and great erudition on a wide range of subjects. One of them set me right about the Modern Art scene in India, on which topic I had recklessly shot off my mouth. I admit that I know as much about the Modern Art Scene in India as I know about the Lesser Scandinavian Poets, namely nothing, but I had never thought I would be so speedily, if gently, exposed as a goof. I quickly learnt the merits of not opening my mouth, except for the purpose of ingesting the beer and the mutton pepper fry.
Interesting place, in short, and it wasn't really opulent or anything, it had a beautiful location and great comfort. The staff was an absolute throwback to colonial times. An extremely geriatric gentleman turned out to be the cook. Eighty two years old, would you believe it. After a particularly delicious meal one evening, young Sundeep sent for him, to thank him for the wonderful meal and cross his palms with silver. It turned out that he wasn't interested in the money at all. That seemed unusual. We looked at him quizzically. After a bit of hemming and hawing, he inquired if he might speak freely. We urged him to ask unto half our kingdom, but all that he wanted, it turned out, was a large drink. The bar had closed and the bar clerk had left for the night, taking with him the keys to the liquor cabinet, so we couldn't buy him a drink. He looked yearningly at a half finished bottle of Scotch that we were sampling rather extensively. Without a second's hesitation, young Sundeep handed it over to him, the rest of the company agreeing that it was a mere bagatelle in the appreciation of culinary genius.
Next morning, we were amply recompensed for the generous liquid gift of the previous night. He cooked up a beautiful meal of "akki rotti" (rice chapaties) and some deep red concoction of spice and tomatoes that was tangy and delicious. I found I had nothing to do. Sundeep had to go back to the estate for some work, so I thought I would hijack one of the cars and explore the countryside a bit. The wife and kids agreed to join and we ended up going to the Belur and Halebeedu temples about an hours drive away. Was that good? Let me put it this way. If I have a one-or-the-other choice between seeing the temples and marrying Shilpa Shetty, I would unhesitatingly choose the temples. Only if it was a one-or-the-other choice, of course. I would much rather do both..........
Sunday, June 3, 2007
A tryst with Mr. Destiny
Mr. Destiny is what I call my friend's astrologer. He can fix it for you.
Want to start a new business? Throw out those business plans and cashflow projections. Mr. Destiny will look at your horoscope and tell you how you will fare.
Usually, he finds that you will fare badly and that you will be cheated by partners and business associates. Your face falls. You've worked a great deal putting together that plan and mobilizing support for it. Now what do you do? Abandon it? Or go ahead and risk Mr. Destiny telling you "I told you so" as you try to piece together your shattered life?
Mr. Destiny reads your thoughts. A tranquil smile flits across his face and he tells you to have faith in him.
Do three things, he says.
First, there are an odd number of letters in your name. This is very bad for Venus, which is the dominant planet for you. So add a letter. Now, this can be fun. If you name is, say, Ashok, an ordinary, everyday kind of name, no one is going to notice it unless you do something seriously big like winning a Nobel prize or making it to the Oval Office. But add an 's' in the right place and you become "Asshok" leading people to believe you are someone of prominence in the pornography industry and consequently, inviting you for dinner. See? Its working already.
Second, wear a moonstone ring on the little finger of your left hand. Amazing coincidence, Mr. Destiny has one in stock, which he will let you have for less than market price. Lucky you. He probably knew that you were coming to meet him, he can see the future, you know. I for one find it most impressive that Mr. Destiny has lunar rocks with him. I tell my wife so. "I thought NASA would have them under lock and key", I mention, in a conspiratorial whisper because Mr. Destiny seems to be in some kind of trance. "You're such a doofus", she whispers back. That statement is true, of course, but why is she mentioning it now? "Because the 'moonstone' is not a lunar rock, it is a gemstone", she says. This does not seem like sufficient grounds to declare me mentally unsound. How am I supposed to know stuff like that? What am I, a contestant on Kaun Banega Crorepati? Bournvita Quiz Contest? Huh? I prepare to present these strong arguments in my defense but my wife fixes me with a stare. I find that the temperature of my lower limbs has gone down considerably. "Want to make it in the evolution race?", the stare seems to be saying, "keep that trap shut". I decide to follow a policy of compliance.
Third, Mr. Destiny gives you a mantra which you have to repeat one million and eight times. Each repetition is to be accompanied with pouring a spoonful of water on a tulsi leaf and put on an idol of Krishna. You are desperately doing some large-number math. Lets see, two seconds for each mantra, thirty in a minute, one thousand eight hundred an hour, let me see.. one million would take..... a really long time. Fortunately, this activity can be outsourced. There is a team of pundits who will do this in such a way as to ensure that the benefit accrues to you, for the extremely reasonable price of ten thousand rupees, payable in advance please.
Now your destiny is fixed. It dare not have the temerity to traverse paths not charted for it by Mr. Destiny.
Till you meet Mr. Good Fortune, who gives you a commiserating look and tells you that Mr. Destiny did not know someone called Jack Shit, implying that his advice is therefore misleading and actually, harmful. You need to have seven syllables in your name, plus it should begin with the letter K, plus you should wear a sapphire ring on the middle finger of your right hand because otherwise Mars in the seventh house will team up with Mercury in the third floor flat and both will kick your sorry ass big time. You might have to get married to a Banyan tree and think of what kind of sex life you will have then, ha, ha, ha.
Some times I really wonder if life is worth living. Now where did I put that bottle of sleeping pills?
Want to start a new business? Throw out those business plans and cashflow projections. Mr. Destiny will look at your horoscope and tell you how you will fare.
Usually, he finds that you will fare badly and that you will be cheated by partners and business associates. Your face falls. You've worked a great deal putting together that plan and mobilizing support for it. Now what do you do? Abandon it? Or go ahead and risk Mr. Destiny telling you "I told you so" as you try to piece together your shattered life?
Mr. Destiny reads your thoughts. A tranquil smile flits across his face and he tells you to have faith in him.
Do three things, he says.
First, there are an odd number of letters in your name. This is very bad for Venus, which is the dominant planet for you. So add a letter. Now, this can be fun. If you name is, say, Ashok, an ordinary, everyday kind of name, no one is going to notice it unless you do something seriously big like winning a Nobel prize or making it to the Oval Office. But add an 's' in the right place and you become "Asshok" leading people to believe you are someone of prominence in the pornography industry and consequently, inviting you for dinner. See? Its working already.
Second, wear a moonstone ring on the little finger of your left hand. Amazing coincidence, Mr. Destiny has one in stock, which he will let you have for less than market price. Lucky you. He probably knew that you were coming to meet him, he can see the future, you know. I for one find it most impressive that Mr. Destiny has lunar rocks with him. I tell my wife so. "I thought NASA would have them under lock and key", I mention, in a conspiratorial whisper because Mr. Destiny seems to be in some kind of trance. "You're such a doofus", she whispers back. That statement is true, of course, but why is she mentioning it now? "Because the 'moonstone' is not a lunar rock, it is a gemstone", she says. This does not seem like sufficient grounds to declare me mentally unsound. How am I supposed to know stuff like that? What am I, a contestant on Kaun Banega Crorepati? Bournvita Quiz Contest? Huh? I prepare to present these strong arguments in my defense but my wife fixes me with a stare. I find that the temperature of my lower limbs has gone down considerably. "Want to make it in the evolution race?", the stare seems to be saying, "keep that trap shut". I decide to follow a policy of compliance.
Third, Mr. Destiny gives you a mantra which you have to repeat one million and eight times. Each repetition is to be accompanied with pouring a spoonful of water on a tulsi leaf and put on an idol of Krishna. You are desperately doing some large-number math. Lets see, two seconds for each mantra, thirty in a minute, one thousand eight hundred an hour, let me see.. one million would take..... a really long time. Fortunately, this activity can be outsourced. There is a team of pundits who will do this in such a way as to ensure that the benefit accrues to you, for the extremely reasonable price of ten thousand rupees, payable in advance please.
Now your destiny is fixed. It dare not have the temerity to traverse paths not charted for it by Mr. Destiny.
Till you meet Mr. Good Fortune, who gives you a commiserating look and tells you that Mr. Destiny did not know someone called Jack Shit, implying that his advice is therefore misleading and actually, harmful. You need to have seven syllables in your name, plus it should begin with the letter K, plus you should wear a sapphire ring on the middle finger of your right hand because otherwise Mars in the seventh house will team up with Mercury in the third floor flat and both will kick your sorry ass big time. You might have to get married to a Banyan tree and think of what kind of sex life you will have then, ha, ha, ha.
Some times I really wonder if life is worth living. Now where did I put that bottle of sleeping pills?
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